Developer: Heart Machine studios
Platform: PC
Genre: Action, 3rd person
Gameplay Stats: 18 hours, 8/12 Steam achievements
Disclaimer: I backed this game on Kickstarter!
Visuals: This game has a very lovely pixel art style! I've been defending the choice of older aesthetics in some of my reviews, so I'll stop that. I can certainly see this 8-16 bit visual style as being possibly divisive, but since I grew up playing 8-16 bit games, I like it quite a bit. Overall this game has a very surreal visual quality to it that I very much enjoy. The colors are bright and most everything pops quite well. The animations are smooth for the most part and I would consider the visual display to be a strength. The game is limited at 30 fps, but I didn't see this as too much of a problem. I've read some mention of framerate issues from some people, but I haven't had any issues.
Audio: The music for this game is down-tempo, ambient electronica. I liked it a lot and I thought it was a good match for the visuals and the sense of story in the game. The feel of the music was pretty isolating, but that matches the tone of the game and story perfectly. The sound effects were pretty good, but none of them especially stood out as being fantastic. The music that plays during the boss fights in HLD is very upbeat and tense which adds a sense of urgency to the giant monster destroying you a few times until you understand his patterns and moves.
Gameplay: This game is difficult! I died quite a lot. The combat was the majority of my deaths, but the combat felt pretty fair for the most part. The main mechanics of the game are a dash, a 3 hit sword combo, and one of a few guns. Kinda like Bloodborne, but there's no parrying and none of your attacks stagger enemies. I think the lack of stagger is an odd choice since your character gets thrown almost every time you're hit, but enemies shrug off damage like it's nothing. It definitely kept the combat exciting, but it felt kind of weird. The clipping on some of the ledges in the game is also not where it should be. I fell through walls and floors consistently in places where I shouldn't have. Staircases were particularly bad. The choice of a single point of view was interesting, but suited the game well. It means that a ton of secrets are hidden right off camera. Some of them are telegraphed a little, but some really aren't. I stumbled across secrets more often than I'd have liked, instead of finding them like I was supposed to. Dashing across pits wasn't always solid, but it was for the most part. I think most of these problems will be fixed with patches, but I played as soon as the game released. The chain-dash that you can unlock seems a bit finicky to trigger as well.
Story: There are no words in this game! When you talk to certain NPCs, they will share image(s) with you to impart their experiences/knowledge. I liked this choice because there wasn't anything getting in the way of exploration. Writing in games is often a pain point, and this game side-stepped that issue entirely. On the flip side, you don't really get attached to characters. The story is also kind of a mystery since there is no exposition. You are exploring a world that seems to have recently undergone an apocalypse of sorts and you need to raise some giant pillar things at the end of dungeon-like areas, guarded by bosses because video games. No motivations are expressed in the game and I think if I hadn't played many games in the same vein I would have been very confused as to what to do, setting completely aside the why. I'd really love to see the story written out by the directors or something. What was conveyed was done well, but I would have liked there to be more. It seemed like a game that was made based on gameplay rather than having a story to tell.
I know it probably seemed like I was nitpicking a bit of this game, but overall I really did like it a lot. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this game at the asking price on Steam. It was a very engaging way to spend my time and I liked the style and tone of the game quite a lot. [8.5/10]
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